A Few Quick Things, vol. 29

Toney sent me an email early this morning, and I read it when I got up. That’s the way we communicate these days… via email and text messaging. And the note said, “Only use the downstairs toilet for #1. Something’s wrong with it.”

Yes, it was very reminiscent of the love notes we used to send one another during our early dating days… Ahhhh, such lovely memories.

I went in there, lifted the lid on the catcher, and the water was way down in the hole, radically low. And it was kinda tan. Dammit! Why do we have so many plumbing problems in this house? It’s almost literally continuous.

I commenced to plunging, and it’s kinda-sorta acting normally again. But I don’t trust it. In a drunken stupor, Sunshine probably dropped her 1880s hand muff in there, and stuffed it on down the pipe while inexplicably screaming belligerence about “the Mexicans” or whatever.

Sunshine and Mumbles: the gift that keeps on giving.

Or maybe it has nothing to do with S&M? It’s possible, because this house has always had questionable plumbing. Both toilets are unreliable agents, the shower drains clog often, and we had to sink thousands of dollars into the upstairs crapatorium. The hot water tank was also replaced last year, because it was starting to go rogue on us.

Why can’t things just work? It pisses me off to squander time, money, and patience just to get back to the where we were yesterday. Know what I mean? If I’m going to burn through time, money, and patience, I want to see some additional benefits; I expect things to improve.

I don’t want to have to pump tan water, in the morning light, just to maintain the status quo. Is that so wrong?

Toney also ripped an article from the front page of the Scranton Times, and left it on my keyboard. This is the story… Weird shit, man. Wouldn’t her “relatives” be in an advanced state of decomposition by now? And she had one of them posed on a couch? Good god.

The four of us are going out to dinner tonight, to celebrate our new-found freedom. I feel like Nelson Mandela! This is my one day off, but the sixty-hour weeks are about to end. I was given that news yesterday. Four more weeks, after this one, and they’re cutting me off. Oh well. I’m surprised they allowed it for as long as they did.

When I go back to forty hours, it’ll probably feel like I’m working a part-time job. I’ll have a ridiculous amount of free time, and no excuses for not making progress on my various projects. Yes, it’s a double-edged sword.

I just added some new stuff to my super-neglected Netflix queue: Law & Order UK, Season 8 of 24, Sex & Drugs & Rock n Roll (about the life of Ian Dury), Nowhere Boy (a British film about the young John Lennon), and The Hammer starring Adam Carolla.

I’m loving the Carolla podcast, and am now interested in his other projects. Who could’ve predicted such a thing? I’m going to buy his book, too. That’s right.

I haven’t looked at my Netflix queue since September, and that’s not an exaggeration. Is there anything new that I need to check out? I’m about to rejoin the world of the living, and would like to get caught up on stuff. Help me out, won’t you? What new stuff have you been enjoying — movie/TV-wise?

And I’m going to meet Steve for lunch tomorrow in Wilkes-Barre, so there probably won’t be a Friday update.

However… metten has resurrected Mockable, right here, so you’ll still have something new to read. A few months ago he asked if I’d mind if he started posting there again, and, of course, it’s cool with me. I probably won’t be able to contribute very often, but metten will keep things interesting.

If you’d like to contribute guest mocks, please send them to him. And you can subscribe to the RSS feed, and even have the updates sent directly to your email inbox. All the info is at the Mockable page. Also, please comment. The site never generated many comments, which was discouraging. He (and I) would love to see a community develop there.

I second your recommendation of “The Hammer”. Didn’t expect much from it at all but liked it quite a bit. Heard Carolla interviewed not long ago and I’ve got his book on hold at my local library. Didn’t do much for me during his “The Man Show” days but he really seems like an interesting guy.

Are you on city sewer? If you are having drainage problems with more than one plumbing fixture, the problem could be in the drain pipe from the house to the street. If you have old clay drain pipe, its probably roots growing into the pipe. Or the pipe may have collapsed.
If you are on a septic system, it may be time to call the guy to clean out your tank.
Just a couple of suggestions.

Yep, I had to do that a few years ago. Replaced the line between the house and the tap into the main line. But, I have a basement, so we had to dig down about 10 feet before we could even get shit started (not literally). And it rained the whole day we did it. Dumbasses. But, shit is flowing like shit through a goose now, so I’m cool.

The first season is available via streaming, and the rest are available via disc. Much better than it looks. It’s an AMC show created by the same guy that created the Sopranos. Mad stands for Madison Avenue – it’s about a NYC advertising firm in the early 60s.

I left a different link to the PA woman-dead family story on the Further Evidence posting from December 31st. Just 36 miles or so from Jeff’s place! He could go visit and take pictures, when his spare time opens up. Seriously though, is she planning on the property remaining in her family for long enough to justify turning it essentially into a cemetery? How would you sell the place otherwise?

Anybody ever see “The Machinist?” It was a really well done movie, in spite of the “twist” ending being a little predictable. Christian Bale literally looks like an Auschwitz survivor in this one, again getting full-bore into his role. It’s just excellent cinematography, in my humble opinion, but few people have seen it.

I saw it. It was hard to keep up with what was reality and what was just the craziness of his mind (hallucinations and such) but in the end I thought it was a good movie.
He lost another ridiculous amount of weight for his role in “The Fighter” with Mark Wahlberg. I swear that man will eventually kill himself with the weight fluctuations he takes on for his roles.

I remember reading about the cook who kept the dead folks propped when the coroner first removed the bodies. I think they said she had been using a certain oil & waxes to keep their “features” intact. But WTF?! And I like how the coroner is quoted as saying he wants to get her relatives back to her as soon as possible. Has the whole town gone cray-cray? Is there something in the water? Do they have dead fish and birds everywhere?! Someone send Erin Brockovich to that town to check the water. Holy hell….
Jeff, as far as Netflix is concerned I recommend you check out ‘It Might Get Loud’. It’s a documentary with Jimmy Paige, Jack White and The Edge. It is basically an hour and a half of Jimmy Paige & Jack White jamming while The Edge fiddles with anything mechanical and looks like a toddler learning to walk amongst the master runners. He doesn’t belong in this documentary AT ALL which is what makes it so great. You can’t compare him to the talents of Paige and White.
It was a great documentary and the best part is you can stream it since it is available on their Watch Instantly feature.

The Hammer was funny. Carolla’s podcasts and old Lovelines with Dr Drew are funny as hell, too.
I have the first season of Carnivale – a show from HBO a few years back. I watched it then but had to own it. Of course, I have absolutely no time to watch. Someday.

My favorite new hr long show from this past season was The Good Guys. Naturally, it was canceled.
The League is a funny show with lots of making fun of people and bad language.

Jeff, I’m feeling your pain on all levels… last Friday, I noticed that my toilet was wobbling when I sat down. I know very little about plumbing, but common sense told me that this wasn’t good.

I left the toilet alone for the weekend, because I was going to be out of town anyway for New Year’s Eve. I finally pulled it out on Monday morning. The good news is that there’s no water damage or anything… but the flooring underneath isn’t at all level. It’s not HORRIBLE, but my brain is optimized for envisioning worst-case scenarios.

So I don’t want to call in a contractor or plumber… because I’m worried they’ll tell me that I need a federal bail-out to rip out the flooring & level it. And I don’t want to just re-seat the toilet myself, because I’m worried that I won’t do it right, and poop water will drip down into the condo below mine. The girl living below me is pretty cute, so I wouldn’t want to do that to her. If she were ugly, that would be a completely different story.

Anyway, I’ve also been crazy busy at work this week… like I worked straight from 10:00am on Wednesday until noon today… so I haven’t even had the time to deal with the toilet.

So I’ve been stuck without a toilet at home now for three days. I release version 2.0 while I’m at work, and I use the bathtub for #1.

Thank Mumble-dump my girlfriend doesn’t live in-town. She wouldn’t handle this well. She knows about it, but I think she’s crammed it into some back corner of her brain so that she doesn’t have to consider the details.

Reseating the toilet is pretty easy. Buy a new wax ring and follow the instructions on the package. Chances of dripping poop spores on your cute neighbor are nil. By the way Jimbo, I don’t recall where you live. lol!

I needed to replace the stopper valve on one of the thrones but I was smart enough to NOT do it on new year’s eve, since the stores would closed at noon until Sunday… good thing… the flusher arm snapped when I was maneuvering all the pieces. Plumbing sucks.

Mumble-rumbles are like thunder… when you hear them, you know there’s a storm a-brewin’.

It’s fortunate that I work in the software development industry and have basically no female coworkers. Mumble-rumbles strike me a few times a week soon after lunch… so occasionally I’ll be sitting in a 1:00pm meeting, and then the rumbles kick in.

For anyone that lives in Atlanta, the most mumble-rumble-inducing food is the jerk chicken plate at Eats. So delicious, but the combination of meat AND spicy seasoning AND beans is the perfect storm.

Did some poor planning today, ate a grilled chicken salad from a sports bar we eat at most Fridays. It’s usually followed by mumble-rumbles, after lunch I had to drive thirty minutes to meet a client. I had to suppress the mumble-rumbles for nearly three hours today. brutal

McDonalds burrrrrritos!!! seem to always drop the digestive systems in to overdrive. Spoiler alert – I’m about to say one word about diarrhea that will probably turn your stomach. Ready? creamy

I’m still trying to decide if I’m lactose intolerant, caffeine intolerant, gluten problemed, irratably boweled (made up words don’t appear in spell check), something more serious or just McDonald’s reactive. I think it’s the latter since today I really stretched the flush capacity of the old American Standard and I haven’t been through the drive through in a week or more …and that seems to be how long I’ve gone without a problem. There you go – McDonald’s stops bowel cancer!!!

OK here’s where it gets weird. I used to watch the Galloping gourmet with my mom when I was little. Mom recently passed and she made it quite clear she did not want us to let her estranged brother know she was gone. I just noticed this guy is a doppelganger for that uncle…from memory of course (I haven’t seen the prick in about 20 yrs). Kinda like a 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon here for me.

My water went brown a few days ago, then my well pump gave up the ghost on New Year’s eve. It felt twilight zonish to flush toilets with Poland Spring water purchased from the convenience store.

Netflix lists all DVDs of Season 8 of “24”–for some damn reason, it isn’t available in bluray–as available “now,” apart from the very first DVD, which is marked as “very long wait.” So, if I want to see them in order, I’m fucked. Why is this?

I recall some of my ancestors referring to porcelain chamber pots as “thunder mugs.” I thought that was pretty hilarious when I was 13. Mostly, no doubt, because I never had to use one. Some of y’all with plumbing problems might want to check out the local antiques stores for the more primitive form of indoor relief. But then I suppose one would still need an outhouse to empty the pot in.

OK…so why doesn’t digging up corpses and posing them in your garage get you a free trip to the boobie-hatch? Sheesh, I’ve never heard of anything so deeply creepy! Especially the part where they put in the clear plastic “face-viewer” so they can see them. Sweet sainted mother of Norman Bates!

this story about the woman and her dead bodies is seriously creepy, the whole story freaks me out, and the fact that the entire town is on board with all of this is insane. she should be commited to a mental institution. moving on…i love ted williams, what an amazing story. when i first saw the video i was blown away. that is not what i was expecting at all. i guess hes super famous now.

A great movie. I saw the ZAZ production of most of the skits included in the movie at a small theater in Hollywood right after I came back west from college–a couple of years before made they the movie. Great stuff, although there was a strange smokey haze hanging over the audience.

I had to take a toilet out recently because my 4 year old flushed a toy salt shaker down it and it got clogged up. I took the toilet off and discovered what looked like roots around the drain hole. Turns out there was a root about the size of a baby’s arm in the drain. I chopped it off and killed the tree why I was at it. I fucking hate plumbing problems. Last time I had a problem with a toilet I threw the whole sonofabitch in the front yard and started over.

To paraphrase your question into an answer: when replying to the last comment, it’s appropriate to use the “Reply” feature. When leaving a general reply, not specifically related to the last comment, use the “Leave a Reply” feature. I hope this clears up a difficult and perplexing question many of us have dealth with.

The end might or might not be near, but right wing nut jobs (not to be redundant) should take care in discharging weapons into the heads of elected officials, because those ricochets can really be dangerous. Yup, it’s our old friend the tea party. At it again.

Yeah, Chuck, I do. To my knowledge, you don’t go around provoking violence against people who don’t agree with you. I doubt that you were the guy who took a potshot at Congressman Giffords’ office earlier. All I want is a little peace and maybe I’ll get some before I die.

I value differences as much as I value agreement. I don’t value violence so much. Given the aggregate of your previous comments, you don’t either.

Is the Arizona Tea party the company that makes Arizona Iced Tea? That stuff is pretty good.

Politics has a weird effect on people. My brother stayed with me for 4 days before he fired his usual opening salvo “Obama is ruining this country”. Nobody took the bait and the topic changed pretty quickly. Maybe something to be said for that.

Violence wise I always secretly hope for less violence as the new year starts. Yes I’m pretty naive. The one that had me throwing my hands in the air was a 40 yr old father that was stabbed by his daughter’s 37 yr old boyfriend. Those ages arn’t typos. Who’d have seen that one coming?

The motherfucker is far from a “right winger” or a tea party member. He railed against the rep for voting against Nancy pelosi and named the communist manafesto among his favorite books. Nice try though.

OK, my toilet’s finally back in… I even officially broke it in, and everything’s holding strong. Upon flushing, I didn’t experience a surge of poop water drenching my feet… the toilet basically performed completely normally and unremarkably. And in this case, that is a huge victory.

After completing any sort of “major” home repair like this, I always feel like a real manly man. I figured it was time to celebrate with a drink. So I went to the fridge… and only had a bottle of Pinot Grigio in there. How the hell am I out of beer during a manly moment like this?

Oh, and thanks WB in OH for even considering helping with the repair (even if it was primarily to see the hottie neighbor). As you mentioned, it was pretty straightforward… just follow the recipe on the back of the box.

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